INFECTED: Global pop star Shakira delayed a concert because of a throat infection, the Associated Press reports. The show, scheduled for Wednesday night in the Dominican Republic capital of Santo Domingo, was pushed back one night on her doctors' advice. The 26-year-old Colombian pop star -- whose latest album, "Laundry Service," has been a global hit -- is on her first world tour, and is scheduled to perform in 50 cities in 30 countries.
SPACED: Celine Dion isn't likely to have her style cramped in the dressing room for her new Las Vegas show. The Canadian songstress, who just launched a three-year appearance at Caesars Palace, has 2,400 square feet of backstage space to stretch out in, reports Ananova. The "mini-apartment" -- which holds dining, living and massage rooms, an office for manager-hubby Rene Angelil, four giant plasma-screen TVs and its own sound system -- is larger by 600 feet than the space allotted to tiger-taming wild men Siegfried and Roy, the news service quotes British mag Hello! as saying.
REJECTED: Director Brett Ratner has bailed out of the upcoming Warner Bros. film "Superman," citing casting difficulties. The move leaves the studio with neither a director nor a star for its superhero flick, which is apparently still (though somewhat improbably) scheduled to begin filming in August. Ratner had met with big-name contenders Brendan Fraser and Josh Hartnett, but had apparently had trouble convincing his Warner bosses to go with Ratner's own choice for the Man of Steel: "Guiding Light" star Matthew Bomer.
PACED: Country kicker Toby Keith has passed the million-ticket milestone for his U.S. concert tour, which began last fall and is slated to wrap up at the end of the month, reports Launch.com. The 42-year-old singer -- whose current album, "Unleashed," features his controversial post-9/11 song "Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue (The Angry American)" -- was just named best country artist in Playboy's 47th annual music poll, published in the mag's April 2003 edition. Keith, whom Pollstar magazine also tapped as the No. 1 country music ticket seller for 2002, is slated to host the CMT Flameworthy 2003 Video Music Awards on April 7.
SUED: Onetime brat-packer Anthony Michael Hall has been sued by insurance company Chubb for failing to disclose a "mental illness," reports the New York Post's Page Six. The insurer paid out $612,000 to producers of Hall's TV series, "The Dead Zone," when Hall checked into a hospital for a day to treat his bipolar disorder, halting filming. Now the insurer wants its money back -- because, it says, Hall failed to mention the illness on a disclosure form that asked if he had been "under a doctor's care for any physical or mental condition during the past five years."
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